The Mental Database

How does the brain convey data between the mind and the body? How and
where does the brain store the structured data used by the mind and by
consciousness? Ken Brown proposes a possible answer to
these questions
in a new paper, The Mental
Database (PDF format). Brown claims that "at present science has
been unable to find any visible form of mental data in the material
world as it currently defined by science". To solve the problem, he
makes comparisons between the capabilities of the mind and those of a
common relational database. He also proposes that current biophysical
scanning methods are able to reveal only brain activity that
transfers data to and from the mind but not the mental data within the
mind itself. Why? Because he believes the mind is not part of the
physical world. Brown's ideas are heavily influenced by the dualism of
AI-opponent Penrose in
which consciousness requires that the material brain must have an
otherworldly
component (e.g. soul, quantum noise, or whatever.) that can't be
reproduced in
non-meat-based hardware. In
particular Brown, like Penrose, denies that any form of Turing machine
can be conscious. Despite the Penrosian slant, it's still an interesting
read.